My Creative Space : finished goods!

I've missed My Creative Space for a couple of weeks as I have been busy sewing!

It was the smallest child's birthday yesterday, she turned two.
More on that another time though.

I decided to make most of her gifts, only buying the furniture and animals for her new carry-along house and a Maisy Mouse dinner set (to match those her sisters have and she always wants the same).

So here's what she got:

Finished Miss Mouse bag made from a Melly and Me pattern, made largely with fabric from the Patty Young Mezzanine line.

Claire guessed right that it was our friend Jemima from the kids program Playschool that I showed previously.
She had no shirt then so I didn't think she was quite ready for her public debut!

She came with a shirt, skirt and pants to match, though literally one minute after she got her and admired her, the small child wanted all Jemima's clothes removed!

And lastly I finally made one of these carry-along houses that have been on my 'to do' list for a long time.

I'll do a post tomorrow with a wrap up of the house, what I used, what I'd do differently and the like in case you are planning to make one.

In the meantime, grab yourself a vat of tea (that's how much you will need to get through the whole list!) and head over to Kirsty's to see what everyone else is doing in their creative spaces.

Chewing like mad

Lately I feel a little like I have bitten off more than I can chew.

So what's the solution???
Give up the kinder committee?
Don't go out to dinner with my girlfriends?
Don't catch up with family?
Spend less time playing with my children?
Ban the sewing machine and computer for a while??

While it might be that I should do the last item to an extent I feel that these two things are a bit of a lifeline for the stay-at-home mum.

Creatively I would feel a bit lost without my little chance to 'make' something each day.

And the online community has afforded me the chance to make valuable and solid connections with so many really wonderful people, many of whom are also parents, making the same daily decisions and facing the same challenges that I find myself making.

So I don't want to lose that.

Instead I am choosing to take that large bite and chew like mad!

How do you it it all in your day?


Here's a few things on their way to completion for an impending birthday celebration...

Melly and Me Miss Mousie bag.

Someone who appears on Playschool....

A dress for the Oliver +s Ice cream dress sewalong - in which I am currently very behind!

I was lucky enough to win this fabric from Amy.

If you have any spare time in your day - head on over to Amy's place to check out the sewalong and maybe join in too.

Barry is a hottie

Well a hottie cover at least!!

I make no secret of it, I love my footy and my beloved Bulldogs have been having a few good years.
Which almost makes up for all the totally crap ones they had when I was in primary school, copping flack from everyone for supporting them.

Sal is another who is passionate about her footy team, so we decided to have a little tipple when our teams played each other - of the crafty variety of course.

And to the winner go the spoils!

I could not believe all the crafty goodness that Sal fit into the parcel that arrived on my doorstep.

Firstly, all the Doggies goodies pictured above that feature "Big Bad Bustling Barry Hall" (who, it must be said, left Sal's team to come to mine at the end of last season, and has been consistently kicking five or six goals a week since then).

How cool are these - a hot water bottle cover, a pin-cushion and pencil case all in club colours.

Next was a nest filled with three sweet crocheted birds, thatI know challenged her in the early days of making them.

I have had to fight hard to keep these I must say.
Three daughters, three cute birdies; in their little minds it's a no-brainer that they are for them....

Then a cute and handy little fabric basket and a very treasured piece of fabric that Sal designed and printed her very own self!
Can't tell you how pleased I am to have this - it will be used for a special project - just for ME!!!

Then to top it all off a huge piece of green duck flannelette that I had commented on when I saw the PJ's Sal made for her daughter, a bunch of colourful flowers that will have endless uses here and a set of coloured pens with different sized tips at each end.

So all I can say is Wow!

Thanks Sally I had so much fun discovering all the items in this parcel and nearly wet myself laughing when I pulled the "Barry Hottie" out of the bag.

I told Cass - another Swannies supporter to look out for some Barry goodness on my blog so she's probably been stalking here all week (we know you all miss him!).

Now, if you'll excuse me, Barry and I are off to bed!

PS - sorry to Sal and Cass that it's taken me all week to blog these gifts, life got in the way this week!

Once upon a time...

... there were two little Princesses who grew so tall

that they didn't fit into their mum's favourite jacket pattern anymore.

but then....
the pattern-making-Fairy-God-Mother made a new pattern!!!
In sizes 6-10, big enough to fit them both for many more years to come.

(Pattern cover pic from Make It Perfect)

Their mum (let's call her the fabric-hoarding-Queen!!), then jumped online and ordered some very special Far Far Away 2 fabric, covered in Sleeping Beauties and Rapunzels to make the new jackets from.

and everyone lived happily ever after!

To have your very own happy ending with a Big Uptown Girl jacket, pop over to Toni's blog and win yourself a copy of the pattern.

(The Queen realises she should have pulled out the Royal Pressing Machine and ironed that fabric after washing it and before posting a pic on the royal blog!)

Wordless weekend

For more Wordless Weekends - visit Little Munchkins.

Livin' in her Uptown world

I couldn't help but hum the lyrics to the Billy Joel track Uptown Girl when I was tracing/cutting/sewing this little jacket, as it is indeed the Uptown Girl jacket by Toni of Make It Perfect.


I must confess, I have had this jacket pattern for quite some time with the intention of sewing it up, but had just never got far enough down the 'to do' list each winter.
So it just kept getting put off.

It's such a sweet jacket.

Fully reversible with a hood and fold up contrasting cuffs, and gathering on the front and back yoke so it's 'dressy' enough to wear for a special outing.

I did it with cotton quilt batting inside intead of Pellon. Jen had done it and said it was nice and soft and warm and I agree, thanks Jen.

I also added a snap at the top and put the button over the top just for show. Claire had done something similar to this with magnetic snaps and I had the same trouble with the machine having trouble with the layers.

So thanks ladies for sharing what you did as you made this.

Despite the way it looks in this pic - the jacket is even!

I made this out of some really lovely heavy red and white woven cotton from Spotlight.

Nic made this gorgeous skirt using it, and I'm pretty sure Tania used the same stuff to make her lovely skirt with too.

The lining is just simple navy with white hailspots from Spotty as well.

I also made a flower rosette brooch to wear on the navy side to give it a lift, but the smallest rejected that out of hand.

"Off, no-like" she said in her clear little voice grabbing at the afore-mentioned brooch. So it's sitting on a shelf at the moment...

This pattern goes from sizes 0 to 5. But I have it under very good authority that it will soon be coming in larger sizes.

I can't wait to whip another couple up for the big girls.

Stay tuned for the coordinating Dortje pants and the moment where I consider whether I have taken it one step too far...

Indoctrination

It's never too early to start encouraging your children to take an interest in the things you love.

Like getting them to support a decent football team, listen to music you grew up on, or enjoy the music you like to listen to now, and also to instill a love of your favourite hobbies.

Two of my favourite things to do are read and sew, so you can imagine how happy I was when my friend "blogless Judy" found this little gem at the library a few weeks ago.

This book is, quite simply, adorable.

It's the story of a little girl whose Grandmother sews her a special dress each year using fabric from her 'stacks of material' (aka The Stash).

She takes her measurements and then the book talks about how Grandma goes about making the dress, showing all the tools of the trade as they go.

Later the dress is taken apart and refashioned, then handed on to someone else to love (OK so I gave away the ending but it's a kids book - you knew there'd be a 'lesson' and a happy ending!).

For those of you good with two sticks and wool - there's even a little something in there for you - Grandma knits a little cardi to go over the top of the dress as well.

The background in some of the pictures includes cut up pattern pieces and it's bright, colourful and easy to read.

I'm telling you - this book is a winner! (even if it's themed a little too close for comfort to something I one day hoped to write about...).

You can see the author details in the first pic, so don't just sit there, go and reserve it at your local library - or request (no demand!) they get it in.

PS - how do you like my new wider blog with bigger pics?? Pop over to this post at Leonie's to see how it's done.

Wordless Weekend

My Creative Cohort

I missed joining in "My Creative Space "this week because one of my creative cohorts and her kids came over to 'play'.

The lovely Gypsy arrived with freshly made chocolate slice (hmmm don't seem to have a pic of the pieces she left here...) and two very sweet boys who had a lovely time playing all day with my three girls. (very hard to get a pic of all five of them...)

No sewing was done, though a number of future sew-along project days were discussed!

There was only the application of a couple of snaps and the chance to play with the snap press, with a view to, said cohort, getting one for herself.

Truth be told it was a mini-matchmaking exercise, they're never too young for that are they??

And as Bec pointed out after seeing the look on the face of the man-of-the-house in this pic - it would be easier to marry off a few in one go wouldn't it? *

We lunched on this...

Then they selected appropriate cool weather outdoor gear (which of course included a Curlypops Super hero headband, a sparkly cape, fairy wings and a footy jumper!) and we went to visit/terrorise the local ducks.

All-in-all a really lovely way to spend a day.

Thanks Gypsy.

* (please know that I write this with tongue firmly-planted-in-cheek, marrying off my children is not one of my major life goals for me or them!)

PS - normal sewing chatter will resume shortly - the machine has actually been humming quite a bit!